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Thursday, October 28, 2010

It’s nearly a month in the NHL season and former Devil Jay Pandolfo doesn’t have a job yet, but he’s still hoping to play in the league in 2010-11 and fight off the thoughts of retirement creeping into his head.

Pandolfo, who will turn 36 on Dec. 27, was bought out – at his request – from the final season of his contract (he was due to make $2.5 million this season) with the hope of catching on with another NHL team and playing a more regular role after being a healthy scratch for the Devils in the playoffs last season.

So far, it hasn’t worked out.

“There’s talk, but there’s not anything happening right now. That’s for sure,” he told me this afternoon. “I’m just kind of waiting. My agent is still trying to talk to teams and let them know that I’m still skating and working out and ready to go.”

Pandolfo said he is skating “with a couple of guys up here in Boston”, including former Islander Shawn Bates. Pandolfo admits the wait has been tough.

“It’s definitely frustrating,” he said. “It’s basically almost November here and still nothing. So, it’s getting frustrating, but I’m just trying to stay as patient as I can I guess and, hopefully, something works out.”

During this time, it has been understandable that the idea of retiring has occurred to him.

“I’m trying not to think about it,” he said. “It creeps in your head when you’re sitting here skating every day and working out every day by yourself and nothing is happening, but I’m trying to not think that way yet, that’s for sure. I think something still might happen.”

Pandolfo is one of several NHL veterans who have become victims of the salary cap era. They probably would still be playing in the league if there was no cap, but teams are choosing to go with younger, low-paid players to fill out their rosters instead of more-experienced guys.

“I think it probably has something to do with it,” Pandolfo said. “It seems like so many teams are pretty close to the cap, so they can’t really add any salary. I think that makes it tough for some older guys. Teams can fill their roster with younger guys now. That just seems like the way a lot of teams are going.”

The hope for players in Pandolfo’s situation is that some teams determine the young players on their rosters right now are not ready to help them right now or that injuries create needs for teams to sign players.

“That’s the thing we’re waiting to see what happens,” Pandolfo said. “I’m sure some of those kids will get sent back to junior before 10 games. Maybe we’re waiting for something like that to happen or, you don’t want to see anyone get injured, but if that happens as well that’s another chance where you might be able to get a job because of that. So, we’re just waiting for that or if a team just decides that later on that they want a veteran guy. That’s another thing that could happen, too.”

Pandolfo said he was not invited to attend training camp with any NHL teams, but that was not an avenue that he and his agent, Bob Murray, pursued. He also said he was not offered an AHL contract by any team.

“We didn’t really go for that route, for the tryout,” he said. “I don’t know if I should have or not now, but I didn’t.”

There are no guarantees with tryouts. Former Devil Dean McAmmond was a late addition to the Islanders’ camp roster as a tryout and was basically kept around so the team could play split squad games during the preseason and let go. Bill Guerin also failed to catch on in Philadelphia after attending Flyers’ camp as a tryout.

“It seemed like that happened for a lot of guys,” Pandolfo said. “It worked out for a couple of guys that went for a tryout, but not many.”

During his down time, Pandolfo has been able to spend a lot more time with his young son, San, and wife, Juliane, which is one of the silver linings for him. He said he “hasn’t really had a chance” to watch the Devils on television because he doesn’t have the NHL package.

He said he keeps in touch with some of his former teammates, mostly by text.

“They’re going to turn it around,” Pandolfo said. “You get off to a slow start and for whatever reason they haven’t gotten out of it yet, but they will. They’ve got too good a team for this to happen, so they’ll turn it around.”

About

TOM GULITTI has covered the New Jersey Devils for The Record since 2002. Prior to that, he covered the New York Rangers for four years. Gulitti joined The Record in 1998 after six years at The North Jersey Herald News. He graduated from Binghamton University in 1991 with a Bachelor of Arts in Rhetoric-Literature.